The Loophole

content warning: child abuse, islamophobia, homophobia, racism, alcoholism, mentions of character death, mentions of bigamy, bullying, mentions of surgery, stillbirth, emotional abuse

Have I read a completely different book than everyone else?

Genuinely, I can't think of a single thing about this book that was good. It's poorly written, the plot is unbelievable nonsense, the characters don't speak or act like people do in real life, and it feels as though the author has tried to make the book fast-paced, but by doing so has not allowed the characters to react to some of the heavy issues that they have to deal with.

This book is full of racism, islamophobia and homophobia. The MC (Sy) is subjected to violent abuse by his father (and this is on page) and has been so for years. After being subjected to a horrible beating and then being made homeless, Sy then travels to London and is detained during airport security, subjected to questioning and is about to be subjected to a strip search. He's 17. Seriously wtf. It basically seems to be blamed on Brexit and because of the colour of his skin but there's a brief conversation once he's released and then it's completely glossed over and never brought up again. He goes through so much trauma in this book that he just doesn't seem to process or even given the chance to address what has happened to him. Almost everyone except Sy's best friend (who's barely in the book) is homophobic, and Sy himself is a gay stereotype which honestly just felt a little bit sad.
Sy also goes to a bathhouse for a naked massage provided by another teen which is just very sketchy in multiple ways.

Plot wise, the entire book takes place over about a week. In this time, the MC meets a stranger at his place of work who knows an alarming amount of information about his life, is given $1m by said stranger, is beaten and made homeless, travels to multiple countries, gets caught up in a riot, gets caught up in an air raid, then gets in a car crash. All in the search of his ex boyfriend who isn't even in his life but who he can't stop thinking about. Lowkey, there was stalking from multiple parties in this book - Reggie, who knew who Sy was and all about Farouk (and we're never given a reason for why she knows so much about him when they've never met) and Sy, who goes to every place that has been posted on his ex's Instagram to find him and basically harasses anyone who's had contact with him in order to track him down. Does Farouk even want to be found? Well that doesn't even crosses Sy's mind. Everything leading up to the ending just seems awfully convenient. The fact that out of thousands/millions of people, Sy finds the exact people he needs in order to gain information on Farouk just isn't believable, but I guess that's the magic realism element? And saying that Farouk is dead but oh wait, no he isn't, was just plain ridiculous. There are also multiple factual inaccuracies in the book but that's a minor problem considering everything else.

The romance as well just didn't feel convincing to me. We're given insight into this through flashbacks that show random moments in their relationship but it didn't give enough context as to why Sy was willing to go across the world to find Farouk. I didn't see the chemistry between them and didn't believe in their love. The conflict between them as well didn't make sense to me either.

I was just left wondering why this was even written in the first place. I don't know what the message or the purpose of the story was because it ends pretty abruptly and we don't really spend time with Sy after he's done what he thinks he needs to do (or at all throughout the book). I can't believe I'm saying this but it felt too plot heavy and there wasn't any room on the page for the characters to grow or be heard, it just felt like a sequence of events that they went through.

There is the potential for a decent book here but some major tweaks would have been needed for that book to actually be the one that was written.

And sorry, but a white(?) woman calling a gay Indian teen ‘little curry puff' just really does not sit right with me.